The Cypress House by Michael Koryta

A journey to Florida's coast becomes an inescapable nightmare in the newest supernatural thriller from international bestseller Michael Koryta.

Arlen Wagner has seen it in men before--a trace of smoke in their eyes that promises imminent death. He is never wrong.

When Arlen awakens on a train one hot Florida night and sees death's telltale sign in the eyes of his fellow passengers, he tries to warn them. Only 19-year-old Paul Brickhill believes him, and the two abandon the train, hoping to escape certain death. They continue south, but soon are stranded at the Cypress House--an isolated Gulf Coast boarding house run by the beautiful Rebecca Cady--directly in the path of an approaching hurricane.

The storm isn't the only approaching danger, though. A much deadlier force controls the county and everyone living in it, and Arlen wants out--fast. But Paul refuses to abandon Rebecca to face the threats alone, even though Arlen's eerie gift warns that if they stay too long they may never leave. From its chilling beginning to terrifying end, The Cypress House is a story of relentless suspense from "one of the best of the best" (Michael Connelly).

While still in high school, Michael Koryta worked as a newspaper reporter and for a private investigator. His first book, Tonight I Said Goodbye, was published when he was twenty-one years old and an undergraduate at Indiana University. It won the Great Lakes Book Award for best mystery. Envy the Night won the 2008 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for best mystery/thriller. He is the author of the Lincoln Perry series and teaches at the Indiana University School of Journalism.

Unrated Critic Reviews for The Cypress House

Kirkus Reviews

Arlen wants no part of any of this but targets Wade out of his love for Rebecca, whose father the judge had killed, and his paternal feelings for Paul, whose jealous anger over his sleeping with her has him acting out in dangerous ways.

The Guardian

Like the smell of the all-pervasive mangrove swamps, corruption suffuses every walk of life in Corridor County, and as Arlen and Paul, robbed of their money and cut off by the hurricane, start to uncover more about what's really going on, Arlen begins to realise their own lives are in danger.

The Guardian

Like the smell of the all-pervasive mangrove swamps, corruption suffuses every walk of life in Corridor County, and as Arlen and Paul, robbed of their money and cut off by the hurricane, start to uncover more about what's really going on, Arlen begins to realise their own lives are in danger.

Book Reporter

Remaining in the area, however, puts both men on another collision course with local law enforcement, and also with each other, as a triangle forms among Paul, Rebecca and Arlen, one with edges so sharp that all three of them will be cut in one way or another.

Suite 101

Chron.com

There is an otherworldly quality to the Depression-era South in Michael Koryta’s The Cypress House, and not just because the hero, Arlen Wagner, knows when people are going to die — they turn into skeletons and their eyes start to smoke.

MostlyFiction Book Reviews

There was more to it than that, and what Tolliver had said had been the truth – the dead weren’t required to help him.”
In Koryta’s latest thriller – noir with a twist of the supernatural – it’s late summer 1935 and a group of hard-bitten WWI veterans and one talented 19-year-old are headed fo...

Monsters and Critics

As Arlen works on building a relationship with tavern owner Rebecca Cady who has her fair share of secrets, he knows it is past time to leave the corrupt town behind but with Pauls life on the line, must make difficult choices that may cost him everything.